


Prodosía - The Betrayal

by insomni_writing



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Demons, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, And Donghyuck is a Demon, Angst, Basically About Broken Hearts And Hell, F/M, Mild Blood, Mild Gore, Renjun is your Soulmate, Romance, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-18
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:48:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24788755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/insomni_writing/pseuds/insomni_writing
Summary: προδοσία {prodosía}, greek: the betrayal. “So, does God exist then?” - “I don’t know. Maybe, maybe not. Does it really matter? You’re talking to me right now, not him.” In which your soulmate sold your soul to a demon.
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Reader, Huang Ren Jun/You, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/Reader, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan/You
Comments: 6
Kudos: 16





	Prodosía - The Betrayal

_And, when night begins to fall_

_From the black oaks, darkening,_

_In the nightingale’s soft call_

_Our despair will, solemn, sing._

_-_

_In Muted Tone, Paul Verlaine, Norman R. Shapiro_

You had been a young and scrawny girl, only seven meager years of age, when you dreamed of your soulmate for the very first time. A usually joyful occasion, you would have been elated about this, celebrated it with your family even. Against your hopeful expectations for destiny and fulfillment, however, it had been an experience of uncertainty and terror for you, and it left you feeling hesitant to speak of it. Years later, you would wonder if it had been an early sign; a bad omen for what was to come.

The first time it happened, you were abruptly torn away from your comfortingly warm sheets of awareness and your naked feet had quickly gone rigid in the inherent coldness of your fantasy, toes curled and numb. Even then, in deepest slumber, you had still been clad in the unpleasantly prickly pajamas your mother had forced you to wear to bed, their color a soft pink akin to cotton candy. They had done nothing to shield you from the chill and your small body shook in a desperate attempt to regain heat.

You had been surrounded by _nothing_. There had been no ground to walk on, no air to breath. The absence of colors and shapes, of sound and sensation; it was nearly unbearable to witness, the silence deafening, the darkness blinding. It felt dead and forgotten there; a lost city sunken down deep, deep to the bottom of the sea, unbreathing, unheard. Overlooking the scene your mind had fabricated in apprehension, you had stumbled on in the obscurity of your dream.

Throat having gone dry, you had swallowed down the pungent taste of fear in your mouth. Your surroundings soon changed then, getting more and more tangible, and milky wisps of smoke, syrupy and thick, started draping around you like murky blankets as they clouded your vision. Nothing had made sense to you, shadows dancing and tugging on your sleeves like playful children asking you to join them, tempting you with their embrace. You followed blindly as your mind whirled. And yet, you could remember clearly that not even they could stop you from spotting him in the dark.

Of course, you hadn’t quite caught onto the young boy’s identity back then. How could you have? He flew through your hazy surroundings; his toothy grin, mouth curled with joy, didn’t let you in on the secret as he sprinted after a vibrant drop of crimson in the dark. You felt the first gust of wind in this strange space tug on your hair with his movement, your chest finally expanding to inhale stale air. This was the person you were supposed to spend the rest of your life with; this was the one supposed to complete you.

You couldn’t have known back then.

The first clue that this boy had to be your soulmate, despite the fear your dreams of him instilled in you, soon came when he turned into a recurring theme in your mindscape. Of course, you would dream of other people, too; your family and friends, and sometimes even your elderly neighbors or the grumpy janitor of your school. Those were people you were familiar with, however, people that you knew. It was indisputable to you: You had never seen this boy before. Dreaming of him felt strange to you. Invasive. Special. Often you’d wonder if he ever noticed you like you noticed him. He’d never seemed to look at you when you saw him in your sleep and you couldn’t help but wish for the day where he would finally glance over his shoulder back at you to be there just a bit sooner.

The second clue was the red string you would see in your dreams. Sometimes you’d trip on the big tangled mess it created on the ground, your feet getting caught in the loops and sinking in mercilessly as if it was quicksand. Your soulmate meanwhile seemed to enjoy it; you’d see his dark hair bobbing up between seas of crimson as if he was taking a swim. Most of your time was spent looking after him enviously as you sat on the sidelines, the string wrapped around your pinky keeping you from joining him. As you grew older you wished you knew why you were the only one forced to stay still, why it was only you the string seemed to want to catch and strangle until you felt your breath be cut short. You imagined what it would look like if your heart were to spill out of your chest onto the ground; would it turn the wool a sickly green instead as envy soured your blood every night?

The last clue that ensured your fate was when you laid eyes on him for the first time while you were awake. Seeing him washed away the cloudy sleepiness from your brain like icy tides of the ocean crashing against rocks, and you almost dropped your coffee in shock. Someone bumped brashly against your shoulder as you blocked the way after coming to an abrupt halt and you struggled to regain your bearings. Mindlessly you kept the strap of your backpack from sliding down your arm as you stared.

You weren’t sure how you’d never met him on campus before; and you were confident you hadn’t. One of his friends calling his name and you instinctively turning to face the source of the noise was enough for your body to go into a state of shock. Something in your chest seemed to snap, to shatter and to burst, to spasm erratically, and your hands surely would have been clutching your shirt above your heart if your arms hadn’t been frozen to your side. People avoided you in their path with barely concealed irritation, but you couldn’t get yourself to take note of it. You were too caught up in the overwhelmingly loud pulsing of blood rushing through your ears as you finally spotted him.

It was like opening your eyes for the first time when you saw the pearly white teeth revealed when he laughed, a sight so heart-achingly familiar from your dreams. His eyes crinkled with a smile as he teasingly bumped shoulders with someone who appeared to be his friend, both of them discussing a subject unknown to you. You struggled to breath. Seeing him was dawn, the youngest sun rays kissing away the night. Hearing him was breaking through the surface of the sea, to finally listen to the waves engage in their eternal dance.

Renjun.

Something in your mind whispered the name that had been called out earlier and you felt it with every cell of your body, with every bone and every drop of blood pumping through your veins: this was him. This was your soulmate.

You didn’t know how long you stood there, unmoving and in shock; but only after he had long vanished from sight your fingers started twitching numbly around your cup. You brought it to your lips, mind void of anything but the deep and dark crimson of fate, and grimaced when the bitter liquid ran down your throat.

It was cold.

It took you some time to regain control over yourself after that. It wasn’t surprise that slowed your thoughts as if sticky tar, tough and gritty, was filling your skull then; you had long accepted this as something that was bound to happen eventually. You knew that. Those born with soulmates would always cross paths.

And yet the encounter shook you to the core. Hours after you had left your university and arrived at your apartment, you were eating bland noodle soup at your tiny kitchen table by yourself and you could still sense your body tingling from the experience. The feeling robbed you of your breath, and you were elated at the thought of him even in the dim light of your rundown home.

It wasn’t your fault that you didn’t notice the glints of red dripping ominously down the walls, intangible strings of crimson, nothing more than faint shadows twirling around you in anticipation. Like snakes they bared their fangs as they waited for the moment to strike, to finally claim their promised pray. Maybe you would have attempted to outrun fate if you realized the danger you were in, to escape whatever evil lay in wait for you. 

But you were just so excited for him to feel the same. 

* * *

It took you a long time to see Renjun again. After weeks of anxious waiting, your heart threatened to unravel before him like a ball of yarn and bare your deepest feelings when you finally saw him moving in your direction through the hallway, tired eyes fixed on some papers he was shuffling through as he walked.

Soulmates were supposed to be your everything. Their heart would beat in the rhythm of yours and they’d feel what you feel, dream what you dream. They were fulfillment, purpose, everything what made you be. Already you felt you were losing yourself, your deepest essence, your soul, yearning to split apart and unite with his.

Renjun tiredly combed his hair with his fingers as his lips moved to silently mouth the words he was reading and he glanced up. Your eyes met and time seemed to stop for a second. Again, you felt a sensation akin to taking your first breath on earth running through you like an electrical current, body tense as your heart raced.

Then he frowned with a sigh and went back to the texts. A gust of air tugged almost unnoticeably on your clothes as he rushed past you, mumbling something you didn’t quite catch and you listened to his fading footsteps between the noises of other students.

Renjun had always been so contended in your dreams. Relaxed. And he’d never once looked at you.

Now that he finally had, you wished the red strings had swallowed you whole back then, consumed you like the bottomless pit opening up inside your chest. Your pinky finger twitched.

You’d finally met your soulmate. And you had the feeling you’d never be whole again.

It was difficult in the beginning. You realized that somehow, for some reason, your soulmate didn’t recognize you as his, something that was proven again and again as you encountered him on campus, each time you saw him as painful as the last. You were in denial initially, believing that it must have been a mistake and he’d just been too distracted to take notice of you. Maybe he’d just ignored the pang in his chest when he was in your proximity, or perhaps it felt different for every soulmate. You’d waited, anxiously, for him to look at you and finally realize who you were. He never did.

You weren’t angry at him. How could you be, when you were over the moon just seeing how happy he was all the time? There was no way you could be upset at him for something he had no power over. There was no way you could ignore that you loved him with all your being because he was a part of you and you a part of him.

But you still felt like you’d lost a part of yourself; a best friend. A love forever unloved.

After some months you were able to deal with the hollow ache in your chest whenever you thought about Renjun. You’d smile softly whenever you witnessed the antics of him and his friends and you’d sometimes chuckle when you overheard a joke he told by chance. Your soulmate was a funny guy.

What you had felt for him had never been his fault, but you had still somehow forgiven him. You were okay.

It was December when he stopped coming to school. You weren’t too worried initially; after all, it was flu season and the corridors of your university were emptier than ever, students staying at home to recuperate a common occurrence during this time of the year. However, you couldn’t help but frown when you accidentally overheard Renjun’s friends talk about how they prayed his condition was going to improve soon; or else he’d miss an event crucial to his career, where he was supposed to be one of the performing acts on stage. He’d been practicing for this very moment for years. It was a rare chance for him to make connections as a singer, the presence of sponsors in the audience a well-known and anticipated fact by students. You bit your lip as your stomach churned with concern at this information. Music was Renjun’s life. You didn’t want to imagine what missing this opportunity would do to him. 

That night you had a dream for the first time in a while. You spotted Renjun once again and felt relief wash over you like a calming wave after all those days he hadn’t shown his face on campus, and a heavy burden seemed to be lifted off your shoulders. However, you came to a sudden halt in your dream when you finally got a proper look at him. 

He was seated on the floor surrounded by familiar dunes of red string, shoulders hunched as he was thumbing the wool as if in deep thought. Something glinted in the dark and your heart seemed to freeze over when you noticed the tears running down his pale face as he cried, panicked gasps loud in the silence of your dream. He looked so desperate, so small. A lost boy drowning in the sea. His lips moved quickly without a single sound escaping them, and you had to strain your ears to hear his breathless whisper, repeating the same words over and over again.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please forgive me, _I’m so sorry…”_

Petrified, you watched a single tear drop from the point of his nose down onto his hands, knuckles white as they tensed around the string. You observed him with terror gripping your heart when he reached behind him and something flashed dangerously in the dark. His hands, his shoulders, his entire body shook as a pair of scissors finally entered your line of sight and your mind went blissfully blank for a moment as you looked on, not comprehending what would follow. The metal trembled as it reached the red thread and you felt your stomach drop, gut wrenching fear spreading through you in seconds. Finally, you found the will to act; but to no avail.

Your mouth opened to scream at him as your legs pushed you to run, your eyes fixed desperately on Renjun as if willing him to stop.

_Please. Please, don’t do this._

His head turned as he glanced up at you, wet tears having gotten caught in his lashes as he looked at you with red rimmed eyes. You saw his adam’s apple bop as he swallowed, breathing in shakily. His chest rose, expanding as if to breath in the world. Then he exhaled and—

“I’m sorry.”

You felt the red string cut with a snap that rang through your ears louder than bombs ever could. Falling to your knees on the icy ground, shards of you, of him and everything digging into your skin, you saw your heart unravel, deep dark red meeting the ground as your connection was destroyed. Your fingers buried themselves in the big lumps of thread, tears clouding your vision as you desperately attempted to shove it back where it belonged.

But your heart was long disintegrated into nothing, and you stared numbly as the floor corroded underneath the remains of string surrounding you, the ground becoming unstable and shaking with groans and aches like old, rotten wood.

There was nothing but wind rushing past your ears with a sharp whistle as you fell into darkness. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hello guys, thank you for reading :) I'd love some feedback! 
> 
> (This story is also posted on my Tumblr @insomni-writing)


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